


Riddler 2.0

by FleetingMadness



Category: Batman Beyond
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-19
Updated: 2017-01-19
Packaged: 2018-09-18 14:21:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,119
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9388976
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FleetingMadness/pseuds/FleetingMadness
Summary: We've seen what happens when Terry faces Joker, but what would happen if he went up against Batman's "smartest" nemesis? Tune in next week to find out!





	

**Author's Note:**

> Since Riddler is barely characterized in the DCAU, most of my Riddler presence is coming from the Arkham series. Sorry if that's a deal-breaker, but I really don't have the time or fucks to waste looking up each of the four episodes across three shows in which he has a speaking role.

"He'll strike again." Bruce stated this as a certainty. Terry already knew it, but he kept quiet. He suspected that it helped the old man think to talk to someone real. "There's no pattern yet, and Riddler always has a pattern. He needs to give people a chance to succeed at stopping them, so that they have a chance to fail."

"Yeah, but petty robberies?" Terry took a step towards the bat computer's screen. "I dunno, from the stories you told me about him I expected something... Bigger."

"You and me both." Bruce laced his fingers and stared at the screen. Five stores hit in the last two weeks in Gotham, all with giant green question marks left behind. When Bruce heard about it, he actually laughed. Hearing it over comms had startled Terry, who had briefly worried Bruce was having another heart attack. This was clearly Nygma, or at least a faithful copycat, and that had left Bruce in a good mood until he took a close look at the evidence. Two department stores, a low-end jewelry outlet, a tattoo parlor, and a holo-arcade, none with financial ties to each other. Two of the stores were owned by Kahndaqi immigrants, but that proved to be a fluke as the rest were born-and-raised Gothamites. The arcade's owner was friends with the jewelry shop owner, but that wasn't surprising, since they worked on the same level of the same street. Bruce had been staring at this data for days, and no pattern had surfaced to him. He was getting frustrated. At least, Terry was pretty sure he was getting frustrated. It could be hard to tell, but he'd been eating slightly less lately, which Terry was pretty sure meant he was bothered.

After a few minutes of silence, a smile spread across Terry's face.

"Hold on a sec..." He walked up to the bat computer console, and looked down at the sprawl of buttons before him. He pulled the cowl back over his head, and paused for a second while the HUD and in-suit comms re-initialized. "Hey, Max? You're seeing this, right?"

"Maxine? You let her in our system?" Bruce glared at the comm system buried in Terry's suit, as though his disapproval could be transmitted through the suit's mic.

"Relax, I didn't let her in anywhere," Terry shrugged. "I just know when she's listening. Which I know you are, Max."

"Just a sec," Maxine Gibson's voice chirped through the suit's earpiece. "Yeah, I've got a display mirror up. What do you see?"

"Nothing but a mad boss yet. Pull up a visual of the hit district. City plan holos, but viewed from the angle of... I'd say around Pippa's Ice Creamery." Bruce's gaze shifted about two inches to the right, resting on Terry's face.

"What are you doing?" Bruce asked. It wasn't an angry question, but to anyone but Terry it would've sounded like one.

"Figuring out the pattern," Terry grinned. The display on the screen in front of them changed to a wire map of Gotham. It zoomed out, then the viewpoint raised, then five points were highlighted on the map, forming a neat arc.

"Oh, I get it," Max said. "Nicely spotted, Terry." Terry traced the arc in the air with his finger, then continued to peel away from the curve and point straight down.

"He's using the different levels of Gotham to draw a giant question mark," Terry explained. A connecting line appeared on the screen as he spoke, courtesy of Max, and a large pink question mark was displayed over the buildings of Gotham, with the dot resting on--

"The history museum," Bruce said. A smile creaked across his face. "Nicely spotted, McGinnis. We might make a detective out of you yet."

"He's probably after the Bialyan Scripture on exhibit there," Max said. "I've heard people say it's the 'biggest riddle of our time,' so he probably couldn't resist."

"But his next target will be..." Terry studied the screen for a moment. "Got it." With a confident grin, Terry started for the Batwing.

"Be careful," Bruce said. "Nygma will be expecting Batman to be on his trail by now. He'll be prepared. And tell Miss Gibson that I'll be installing frequency jammers inside the batcave after you leave."

"You know you like the company," Terry said as he dropped into the cockpit.

* * *

Edward Nygma had prepared for old age. As soon as the technology had become even remotely viable, he had backed up his personality into an artificial brain, continuing to update it daily until he finally passed away. After that, he had to wait for the rest of the world to catch up; But finally, through a combination of holographic displays, soft metal components, and good old-fashioned robotics, a robot body could be made that met The Riddler's exceptional standards for human replacement; which is to say, it looked and moved exactly like he had around age thirty.

After cashing in on some investments he'd made in preparation for his revival, he'd started planning. Months had passed before his plan was complete and perfect, then another few weeks while he gathered the necessary henchmen, but finally, he was ready. His plan was perfect, and even now that Batman was back, there was no possible way someone that old would have the knowledge of the city and lateral thinking needed to solve his latest riddle.

Which is why, all things considered, the situation he was faced with really shouldn't be happening.

"So what do we do, boss?" asked a nearby henchman. He was met with silence as Riddler stared, confounded, at the note in front of him, stuck into the wall with what was unmistakably a batarang. Typed on it was a basic two-line couplet: "His story begins with a father who died / saving the world from a great power's pride." Nygma stared at it, turning over hundreds of possible meanings in his head, until he finally came to one simple conclusion.

"He's riddling me." This simple declaration was utterly meaningless to the Riddler's henchmen, who exchanged confused shrugs.

"So, are we going in?" asked one man.

"Of course we're not going in!" Riddler snapped, rounding on the man. "Don't you see, Batman solved the puzzle somehow! We have to move fast. You two!" He pointed to two nearby henchmen. "Go check the other targets. See if there's more of these, and send me the writing on them." He pulled a phone out of his pocket, hit a few buttons, then spoke into it. "All Riddler henchmen, converge on the final target. We're moving ahead of schedule." He stalked away, the offending riddle clenched in his fist. From a nearby rooftop, Terry grinned.

"Got him."


End file.
